The Giant Panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca), also known as panda bear or simply panda, is a bear native to south central China. It is easily recognized by the large, distinctive black patches around its eyes, over the ears, and across its round body. The name "giant panda" is sometimes used to distinguish it from the red panda. Though it belongs to the order Carnivora, the giant panda is a folivore, with bamboo shoots and leaves making up more than 99% of its diet. Giant pandas in the wild will occasionally eat other grasses, wild tubers, or even meat in the form of birds, rodents, or carrion. In captivity, they may receive honey, eggs, fish, yams, shrub leaves, oranges, or bananas along with specially prepared food. While bamboo contains high quantities of cyanide and cellulose, pandas have special microbes that live inside the digestive track to digest the poisons and tough skin of the bamboo. Pandas also have 5 toes and a special "panda's thumb", which is an enlarged wrist bone so they can grasp the bamboo stalks with ease. They also have one of the strongest bite forces of all mammal carnivores to crack open hardy bamboo. Some even argue that they have a bite stronger than a jaguar's. When a panda is born, they are only the size of a banana or a stick of butter. The coloring of panda is so that the panda cub can easily spot the mother anywhere in the forest. Pandas are also great climber and cubs have to be in order to escape predators like Indian leopards, martens, and dholes. In 2016, the giant panda was taken off the endangered species list and is now considered Vulnerable thanks to conservation programs.
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